Topics

Kindle Fire

Kindle Fire is a tablet computer released by Amazon and due to ship on November 15, 2011. The Fire features a full color 7-inch display with multi-touch. The tablet enables web browsing through Amazon Silk, and the purchase of books, movies, TV shows and games. Applications are purchased through the Amazon AppStore.

Amazon Prime customers are able to instantly stream movies to the Amazon Fire.

The Fire competes directly with Apple's iPad, but undercuts it on price: The Fire costs $199, versus the iPad at $499.

The critical response to Amazon's new Kindles has been generally positive, with many commentators praising Amazon for its competitive pricing. However, Amazon reportedly loses money on every Kindle Fire sold -- the size of this loss has been estimated at $10 per unit. It's thought Amazon will aim to counter this loss through content sold to these devices via the Amazon Store.

The Kindle Fire runs a new web browser, Amazon Silk. The browser relies on Amazon Web Services to load pages faster with fewer resources. However, some commentators have questioned the privacy implications of Silk: Browsing activity is sent to Amazon, although this data is encrypted.

The Fire is the most expensive of six Kindles sold by Amazon. The remaining 5 are: The Kindle ($79), Kindle Touch ($99), Kindle Touch 3G ($149), Kindle Keyboard ($99) and Kindle Keyboard 3G ($139).

Amazon is holding an event in Seattle in a couple of weeks, and everyone's invited. Really -- anyone in the world can theoretically sign up, although the company says space is limited. Democratizing a tech launch event -- typically a very insider-y a...

Samsung products were the most popular type of Android tablet that Americans and Canadians used to surf the web, beating Amazon's Kindle Fire tablets for the first time, online ad network Chitika has found.

Amazon's hardware efforts will soon extend into the smartphone space, with the ecommerce giant debuting a new handset this fall, according to a report. Following years of rumors, supposed leaks and analyst speculation, The Wall Street Journal on Frid...

E-book subscription service Scribd is looking to take on Amazon from within. The company launched a new app for the Kindle Fire on Wednesday that will provide an alternative to Amazon's e-book market. Scribd was originally started as a document shari...

For the fourth holiday season in a row, tablets are some of the hottest gifts of the year. A few years ago, it was easy to pick a holiday tablet: Just get an iPad. Fast-forward to 2013 and the situation is a bit different. Not only are there multiple...

Although Black Friday has a reputation as a launch pad for some of the most aggressive deals offered by major stores and brands, in recent years Cyber Monday has also shaped up as a choice time to find a deal. Keying in on this trend, Amazon has anno...

When you get a new tablet, whether it's your first or 50th, you immediately download the most popular apps. Basics such as Facebook, Pandora, Candy Crush and Netflix are standard, but what else should you put on your new Kindle Fire? Picking the righ...

When Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos said he wanted to show me a new feature called “May Day,” I instantly imagined some sort of panic button and, in a way, that’s precisely what this feature is: a soft button that staves off high-tech fear by conn...

Jeff Bezos is in a good mood. His day will likely resemble a gauntlet, with dozens of tech journalists marching into Amazon headquarters three at a time to hear him repeat details of the three new Fire tablets and cutting-edge customer service progra...

Here's more evidence that Amazon may soon unveil its next-generation Kindle e-reader and Kindle Fire tablet devices: All day on Thursday, Amazon will offer flash discounts on various Kindle Fire devices and accessories. Currently, Amazon is selling r...

With the newly announced Google Nexus 7 and rumored Retina Display iPad Mini, it looks like Amazon may be stepping up its game. An allegedly leaked set of benchmark results for an unreleased Kindle Fire HD suggests Amazon will launch a slate with a 2...

Microsoft recently launched Office for the iPhone. In years past, when Microsoft software didn't just rule, but defined "computing," bringing its gold-standard productivity suite to the world's most popular device would have been a gigantic move, wit...

Amazon has made its Kindle Fire HD and Kindle Fire HD 8.9'' tablets available for pre-order in more than 170 countries. So far, these devices were only available in the U.S., the UK, Germany, France, Spain, Italy and Japan. Now, they're available (al...

Amazon and Barnes & Noble have lowered some of their tablet prices for Mother's Day, with savings ranging from $20 to $50. Barnes & Noble's 7-inch Nook HD can now be had for as low as $149. The 16GB variant of the 9-inch Nook HD+ now costs $179, whil...

Amazon may have struggled to meet demand for its Kindle Paperwhite e-reader over the holidays, but evidence suggests its large-format Android tablet, the Kindle Fire 8.9, may not be as popular with consumers. As part of a Valentine's Day promotion, A...

In a move that may augur more Siri-like functionality for its tablets, Amazon on Thursday announced it is buying Ivona, a firm specializing in text-to-speech technology. The Poland-based Ivona's technology verbalizes written text messages. Amazon has...

Apple's iPad may have lost some ground in the tablet market during the holiday season, at least according to one new study. Chitika, a mobile ad network, analyzed web usage during the holiday season and found that the iPad's share of tablet web traff...

Over the last week, I've found myself wondering what Steve Jobs would make of Windows 8 if he were alive today. It's likely he would be entirely dismissive or unwilling to comment on the new OS at all. Even so, I'm betting he would consider the new W...

Amazon says it set a one-day record for Kindle sales on Cyber Monday as consumers flocked to a $129 offer on the Kindle Fire. The company also broke its Black Friday record for Kindle sales and Kindle products occupy the top four spots for overall sa...

Who says Cyber Monday is dead? Amazon has slashed the price of its 7-inch Kindle Fire to $129 for one day only. The Kindle Fire (not to be confused with the more powerful Kindle Fire HD) usually sells for $159, with special offers. Users can save $30...

Amazon expands its tablet sights with the bigger, more powerful Kindle Fire HD 8.9. Can it compete against Apple's iPad? If there’s one company that deserves credit for reigniting the iPad competitor market, it’s Amazon. Despite some bugs and an over...

The first issue of The Walking Dead, The Official Magazine came out globally Tuesday on iPad, Nook and Kindle Fire, while the print version with various covers also hit newsstands in the United States. Titan Magazines and Skybound had previously teas...

Microsoft unveiled on Tuesday details about pricing and availability for its new 10.6-inch Windows 8 tablet, the Surface. As more tablets hit the market, consumers are faced with the task of weeding through the proliferation of options. The Microsoft...

The tablet market got another shakeup today, with Barnes & Noble unveiling its new Nooks: the HD and the HD+. They come just a few weeks after Amazon showed off its new Kindle Fire HD line, which set a new standard in tablet value and performance. Bu...

Less than one week after Amazon unveiled its latest Kindle Fire HD tablet, the device was already occupying about 11% of all Kindle Fire traffic, a new study suggests. According to a data conducted by Chitika Insights -- which looked at hundreds of m...

Hardware site iFixIt posted a teardown of the new Kindle Fire HD tablet, revealing more details about its inner workings and that it's easy to take apart for repairs. Although the teardown revealed a lot of what we already know about the 7-inch devic...

Amazon is developing its own mapping API, the retail giant announced Monday, just days before Apple is set to release its own mapping service to the public as part of iOS 6. The announcement confirms earlier reports that Amazon had acquired 3D mappin...

The Next Big Thing

Mashable
is a global, multi-platform media and entertainment company. Powered by its own proprietary technology, Mashable is the go-to source for tech, digital culture and entertainment content for its dedicated and influential audience around the globe.